Production Season 5 or the Direct-to-DVD films was the first season of Futurama after the 4 year hiatus that followed the cancellation of the show at the end of Season 4, it consisted of four films each cut into four episodes, making for a total of 16 episodes for the season.

Unlike prior seasons, season 5 was ordered by FOX Home Entertainment as four films. FOX Home Entertainment hoped to make more profit out of them by cutting them into episodes and having them aired as regular TV episodes on Comedy Central as a season 5. However, season 5 is not considered part of a run, such as the original run or the second run.

Broadcast wise, the entirety of production season 5 is broadcast season 6. Meaning for the first time an entire production season was aired as one broadcast season, although its episodes were aired in chunks of four. Despite the first broadcasts listing this production block as season 6, Comedy Central began referring to its episodes as 001 - 016, rather than 601 - 616, in the lead up to the release of the sixth production season. The preceding episodes retained the original broadcast numbers and the new season took the 6XY numbering, matching the production codes. Rather than "Season 0" this presumably is a way of labelling the films' episodes as specials.

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In the course of season 5, Futurama initially deals a lot with the cancellation. And the hiatus of the show is at times referred to later. Season 5 picks up on things that first four seasons left unanswered.

Due to good sales on the DVDs for Futurama, FOX Home Entertainment had decided to order a couple of Direct-to-DVD films of Futurama, after negotiations, the producers agreed to fund four films, but on the condition that they would be able to be cut up into four equally sized episodes for television airing.

Work began on Season 5 in 2005, where the first few writers started brainstorming.

In January, 2008, Comedy Central obtained the rights to air Futurama on cable television in the United States, and started airing reruns of the former four seasons. They also bought the rights to air the new season 5, which is simply the films adapted for television broadcast.